betrayal & protection
by cedricsowner
Summary: How far are Ilsa and Guerrero willing to go to protect Chance? Very dark. Deals with torture, drugs and violence towards women. Sexual references, too. FINAL CHAPTER up now.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

Ilsa had meticulously done as she had been told: She had used public transportation to get to the run-down motel on the seedy outskirts of San Bruno, paid in cash for the tickets and averted her face from every security camera in sight. Feeling a little ridiculous, she had even put on sunglasses and a headscarf, hoping to escape those she didn't notice. Now she was hiding in the shadows of a dark alley, waiting for him.

Despite his warnings not to arrive too far in advance she was early, though. "The longer you hang around somewhere, the more chances someone notices and later remembers you", he had explained and of course his reasoning made sense.

But she had been, mildly put, _nervous_, and the growing feeling of nausea spreading from her stomach rapidly up her chest and all along the inside of her throat had eventually driven her out of her apartment and on the road. Of course that had done nothing to reduce her uneasiness and by now it had taken firm hold of her whole body, but at least the short trip from San Francisco by BART had given her something to do.

Granted, she had to wait now, too, and not in the comfortable sanctuary of her apartment, but in a dirty, reeking alley, freezing in the cold wind that was coming in from the Bay. Plenty of time for second thoughts…

And you bet she had second thoughts.

Could she still call it all off and walk away?

Yes, she could.

Airplanes heading towards San Francisco International were leaving vapor trails all over the steely gray sky.

He would understand. In fact he would probably even welcome her decision, considering how hard he had tried to talk her out of this. But he didn't know the whole story…

She had weighed her options for days and in the end always came up with one single solution: Should she really want to go through with the rest of her plan, this here, the next three days and everything they would involve, inevitably had to be the first step. She had to take this precaution.

The strap of her travelling bag started cutting into her shoulder, but the ground was so filthy, she didn't want to put it down. The hands of her watch seemed frozen to the spot. Time was creeping forward at snail's pace. Still an eternity to go… Then she saw a black rental pull up in the motel's parking lot.

Thank God it was him – way before the appointed time. He knew her well…

His movements were totally casual. Nothing about him gave away how he felt about the upcoming three days. He got out of the car and retrieved a large trolley bag and a holdall from the trunk.

The sight of the trolley bag made Ilsa's stomach clench.

She was quite sure he had already noticed her, but nevertheless she waited till he was on his way to the motel's lobby before stepping out of her hiding place.

He acknowledged her presence with a brief nod. "Boss", he said.

"Mr. Guerrero", she replied.

An icy-cold wave of fear washed over her.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

She had asked him what to wear.

"Something washable. Not expensive. Make sure you've got plenty to change."

So she had settled for a collection of jogging suits. Six sets. And lots of underwear.

"I'll change in the bathroom", she told him. The strip light above the sink flickered, making her look older than she actually was.

When she got back, he was already preparing the bed. She noticed fresh linen that didn't look as if it belonged to the motel. Clean sheets weren't the only things he had brought for the bed, though.

"Leather restraints?"

"It's safer for both of us. In case you get a seizure you can't hurt yourself and I can easier take countermeasures." He studied her carefully to see if his words had any effect.

In reply, she walked over to the bed, drew back the sheets and lay down.

Guerrero nodded, opened another compartment of his trolley bag and produced a foldable stand. Ilsa knew what it was for, but she hadn't expected it.

"A drip infusion?"

"Best way to get the stuff into your system", he explained. "And easiest way to flush it out again, should problems arise." He walked around the bed to tie her right wrist, making sure he could slip three fingers underneath the restraint. Then he moved on to her right ankle. Hands already holding the leather strap, he paused.

"One more time, Ilsa – are you sure about this?"

A couple was having an argument in Spanish in the room next door.

"We've already discussed this, Mr. Guerrero. Excessively." She appreciated his concern. Nevertheless she wasn't willing to go through another twelve rounds of discussion with him. "I've made up my mind."

"Doesn't mean you can't change it." He applied the restraint to her ankle. "This is not like running six miles every day for a year and then taking part in San Francisco Marathon. "Training" in this case means learning how to deal with a severe onslaught on your body and mind. _Deal with_, Ilsa, nothing more. There's no way to reduce the effects."

She didn't answer. Guerrero understood. Everything there was to say had already been said. He applied the rest of the restraints, then pinched her fingers and toes, making sure the skin returned to its normal color in due time. Afterwards he put a pulse oximeter on her left index finger and attached it to a small monitor on the floor next to the drip stand. It sprang to life with a soft bleep and started displaying curved horizontal lines and vertical peaks following each other in regular intervals.

Ilsa noticed that he had not only changed the bed sheets but also brought a waterproof mattress pad.

He put on rubber gloves and carefully disinfected a small spot on her left arm with a strongly chemically smelling piece of wet cotton. When he proceeded to set up a catheter, she held her breath.

"If the needle alone already makes you nervous…"

"I was just wondering how to explain the marks to Chance", she replied tersely.

"Don't we all?", he thought and attached a fluid bag to the drip stand.

"Point of no return, boss", he told her, silently adding: "For both of us. If Chance ever finds out about this, he'll kill me."

Again she didn't answer.

He connected the bag with the catheter on Ilsa's arm.

As Ilsa watched the sodium thiopental slowly flow out of the bag, down the IV tubing and into her vein, Guerrero opened his trolley bag again and retrieved a medium-sized square object. He placed it on the nightstand next to Ilsa's head.

She recognized the object. The small monitor on the floor started showing higher peaks in rapid succession. "Mr. Guerrero?"

"Yes, boss?"

"What is the car battery for?"


	3. Chapter 3

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

"You first lesson will be to learn how to control your tongue under the drug's influence. That's the key to everything else. You fail at this, we can pack up and go home."

"Mr. Guerrero", Ilsa repeated, hoping to sound stricter and more boss-like this time, _"What is the car battery for?"_ She wasn't feeling the effects of the thiopental yet, but Guerrero using a thin wire to connect her chest with the battery surely made up for that, uneasiness-wise.

"Thiopental causes you to lose focus", Guerrero continued, totally unfazed. "The theory is that lies are more complex than the truth. Without the ability to focus you're more likely to tell the truth than a lie. Thus the safest way to keep a secret under the influence of thio is to keep your mouth shut."

He fumbled with the car battery.

"Guerrero…" Unconsciously, Ilsa started pulling at the restraints. He reached out and pressed a palm down on her left arm. This was not a gesture of comfort or reassurance, it was a gesture of control, a reminder that she was firmly tied up and any form of struggle completely senseless.

"The rules for today's lesson are very simple. All you have to do is remain silent. Absolutely, completely silent."

She gave the car battery a pointed stare, then looked at Guerrero, arching her eyebrows.

"I'm going to use light electric shocks to ingrain the silence lesson into your subconsciousness. Every word you say from now on will be answered with a brief sensation of pain."

"Define _light_", Ilsa demanded. She was angry – he hadn't told her this beforehand. He had said that the training lessons she was asking for would be uncomfortable, potentially dangerous and painful, but he had said nothing about electric shocks!

Guerrero flipped a switch and Ilsa's upper body convulsed.

Ilsa wanted to scream at him, ask him what the hell he was thinking and order him to take off the bloody wire immediately. Then she saw his eyes, resting on her, waiting, and it dawned on her that that he would indeed take it off immediately. And also the restraints. The pulse oximeter. The catheter. He would pack everything up and leave.

No. Not an option.

She swallowed her scream, her anger and also her last illusion of control. In silent reply she opened and closed her eyes slowly once, giving Guerrero free rein to do whatever he felt necessary.

To her utter surprise, he switched on the TV.

It didn't take her long to figure out why he forced her to watch the worst of pre-evening TV, though. Sodium thiopental disorganizes a person's thoughts, makes them swirl around like a cork on rough water. In this situation outside input, in form of another person's questioning or, more general, talking, comes across as a lifeline to regain orientation. Thus the habit of people drugged with thio to comment on everything they hear: In the midst of drug-induced confusion, responding to others seems to be the only way to stay on a more or less clear path. And what could incite a smart woman like Ilsa faster to comment than silly TV?

She managed to make it safely through a rerun of Baking with Julia. Drawing on every piece of willpower she had, she also kept her mouth shut through Family Feud, but Dr. Phil was definitely too much. Guerrero had announced he would punish every utterance from her with an electric shock and so he did.

He wasn't gloating about it or showed any indication that he was enjoying himself. On the contrary: He checked Ilsa's vital signs with great concentration and every two hours he loosened the restraints for 15 minutes to make sure they weren't causing her permanent damage.

"A true professional", Ilsa thought between streams of tears.

And of course she told him so.

Ouch.

By early afternoon he had reduced her to a whimpering bundle. But he had also managed to implement a firm connection between talking and pain deep in her subconsciousness. She remained silent throughout the whole Jerry Springer Show. Granted, when the show finally faded out, she felt so sick, Guerrero quickly had to loosen the restraints and draw out the needle so she could bolt into the bathroom and throw up violently. But she had made it!

"You've done well, boss", he told her, holding back her hair. Afterwards he brought her back to bed but didn't restrain her. "End of school for today." He ordered in food and made it very clear that he didn't regard "I'm not hungry" as an excuse for not eating. As soon as it was dark outside he went for a short walk with her to give her muscles a chance to stretch, then he put her to bed again.

As Ilsa slowly drifted off to sleep that night, lulled by the steady rhythm of Guerrero's breathing coming from the armchair by the window, she wondered if it was really worth all of this.

Okay, truth to be told, what she exactly thought was:

"Is _he_ worth all of this?"

**_A/N: Thank you, Pin, for leaving a comment, it means a lot to me! _**


	4. Chapter 4

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

The question whether Chance was worth all of this was still lingering in Ilsa's mind when she woke up the next morning. It intensified and developed nagging persistence during breakfast (Guerrero insisted, once again), when she could hardly sit up because the muscles in her upper body burnt with every move. Swallowing was a problem, too – her throat was raw as sandpaper from crying and throwing up. Foreseeing this, had Guerrero had ordered scrambled eggs and other stuff that would slid easily, but still…

After such an incident like last week's, where Chance had… God, Ilsa hated even thinking about it… Anyway, after such an incident most women would have kicked the idiot's ass and walked away. Or at least not answered his phone calls for a week or something like that. But they would surely NOT have devised a complicated and, as it turned out, bloody painful, plan to examine the background of said incident. _His inner motivations._

To be honest, right now, while Guerrero was strapping her to the bed again and giving her another dose of thiopental, this time setting up the catheter on her right arm because the vein on her left arm was already in the process of narrowing, she didn't give a damn about Chance's inner motivations.

But there was also that extra knowledge part. That _disturbing_ extra knowledge part she hadn't been aware of she had till the meeting with Winston. The part she hadn't mentioned to him, Guerrero, or - of course not - Chance. The part she was convinced she needed to shed light upon at all costs. To help Chance. To protect Chance.

Or at least so she had thought – before the vomiting and the electric shocks… Now, after yesterday's trip through the first few circles of hell, the _Is he really worth all of this?_ didn't leave her alone anymore, rang in her mind like the stroke of a gong in a Buddhist temple during silent meditation.

To her great relief, Guerrero didn't set up the car battery again. Instead he placed a rather large tumbler (20 ounce maybe?) where the battery had stood. A sight a lot less threatening!

Well, at least until he dropped a small white pill into it and added a little water… The pill started hissing furiously.

"What is that?" The small monitor that was attached to Ilsa's pulse oximeter started showing high peaks in rapid succession again.

"Yesterday you learned how to keep quiet under the influence of thio. But sometimes that isn't enough. You need to tell the interrogator something or the next step of your interrogation will be torture. As I told you, lies are more complex than the truth and it's very hard to form complex thoughts when drugged with that stuff – thus thio's reputation as a truth serum. Nevertheless it is possible."

He retrieved a cardboard with a schematic drawing from his trolley bag and placed it in front of the TV. "Today you'll learn how to think complexly despite the drug." He pointed at the drawing with a pen. "This is a house. On the first floor you can see three circles next to each other. Those are light switches. They're connected with a light bulb up on the attic, that's the single circle right underneath the roof. You can't see the light bulb on the attic when you're on the first floor. It's your task to find out which switch is connected to the bulb. You may only go upstairs once to check. How do you do it?"

"What is in the glass?", Ilsa asked.

"You'll find out, shouldn't you be able to answer the question. You've got three hours." He put an alarm clock next to the tumbler, then paused for a moment. "There is no try and succeed way to focus under thio. But most people think of a familiar place. They imagine walking around in it, concentrate on where the different pieces of furniture are located, the pictures on the walls, the carpets… It helps them reorganize their thoughts."

With that, he retreated to the armchair by the window, leaving Ilsa to herself. From time to time he checked her vital signs, but that was it.

The clock was a wind-up alarm clock and its ticking grew more and more nerve grating the emptier the fluid bag on the pole became. Ilsa tried to follow Guerrero's advice and called up the memory of the house she had spent her early childhood in, but the noise of the clock cut through it like a hot knife through butter. "Maybe I call someone to help me?", she asked tentatively.

"No helpers are allowed. Just you", Guerrero replied, got out of the armchair, walked over to the nightstand and poured some more water into the glass.

Ilsa understood – the more unsuccessful attempts, the more water in the glass. And in the end he would make her drink all of it.

Her mind was slowly turning into a whirlwind of pictures.

She tried it with a different memory. This time she recalled the mansion in the Tuscany where Marshall and she had spent their honeymoon. They had been so happy there, Marshall had bought it afterwards. But the image was blurry, kept shifting. One and a half hours passed, then, more out of despair than anything else, she dared to utter: "Maybe if I drill a hole in the ceiling that separates the first floor from the attic so that I can see the light bulb?"

"No tools", Guerrero said and added more water.

Ilsa was getting panicky. Fast. The ticking of the clock, combined with the leather restraints that rendered her completely immobile, drove her crazy. Besides that the glass was already damn full, her swirling, spinning, tumbling mind produced all sorts of horror scenarios what effects the white pill might have and she was running out of time. Part of her actually wished the car battery back.

Maybe buildings didn't work for her? She pictured Chance's face instead. She was doing all this for him, after all. So maybe if she concentrated on his blue eyes, the thin lines around his mouth when he smiled, the tiny scar on his chin… "The light switches look very close to the window", Ilsa observed, studying the picture carefully. "What if I went outside, looked at the light bulb through the attic's window and at the same time flipped the switches by reaching through the first floor's window?"

"Nice try, boss." Guerrero filled the glass to the rim.

Ilsa wanted to scream. _Is he really worth all of this? _echoed in her mind like thunder in the mountains.

At this very moment, when she was on the brink of telling Guerrero she had enough and wanted to go home – IMMEDIATELY – her mental image of Chance started changing. Instead of his face she could now see his complete upper body half. Shirtless. Ilsa let out a groan. If there had ever been an inappropriate time for lusting after Chance's muscular chest, it was now. Damn drug.

Then her imaginary Chance started moving. He turned so that she could see the side profile of his face. And the tattoo on his shoulder. _His tattoo._ Her eyes followed the curved lines of the greenish dragon, all the way from its snout, along its wings down to the tip of its tail. She could see every detail of the creature, as if he was really standing right in front of her.

"We're talking about conventional light bulbs here, aren't we?", Ilsa asked. Guerrero didn't correct her. "Conventional light bulbs give off heat – the glass warms up if you leave them switched on for a while." Merely sixty seconds were left on the clock. Ilsa took a deep breath. It was all or nothing now. "So I would do the following: I flip the first switch and wait for fifteen minutes. Then I turn it off again, flip the second switch and go upstairs. If the light bulb is on, it's the second switch. If the light bulb is warm but not on, it's the first switch. If the light bulb is cold, it must be the third switch."

Guerrero walked over to the nightstand and turned off the alarm. "Congrats, boss."

Ilsa let out a deep sigh of relief. The mental image of Chance winked at her before it disappeared.

Maybe he was worth all of this after all.

**_A/N: I did not invent the riddle with the house - it's from a psychological test to measure creative thinking (which I failed miserably). It was hard to describe, I hope it's not too confusing. Thank you, jackattack and veniceit, for leaving comments on this fic! Every single one is cherished!_**


	5. Chapter 5

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

Ilsa was tied up and drugged even before her drowsy mind realized that Guerrero must have yanked her out of bed and dragged her over to the armchair by the window. The curtains were closed, but judging from the grayish light filtering through, it had to be very early in the morning.

No drip infusion this time – Guerrero had given her the thio injection directly into her femoral artery, making her cry out with pain. He did put on the pulse oximeter, though.

"What…?"

"Today we'll test your newly acquired abilities under as real circumstances as possible, Ilsa", Guerrero said, checking her restraints. "I'm using cable fixers this time, so don't struggle. They cut into flesh easily."

Ilsa was still in the process of understanding what was going on. For the past two days, Guerrero had taken really good care of her. And now this? No breakfast? Cable fixers? Since he had given her the full dose of thiopental all at once, the effects of the drug hit her full force. She gasped painfully as it dragged her mind into a vicious maelstrom, threatening to tear it apart.

Guerrero pulled up a small table next to the armchair and placed a small object on it. Ilsa cautiously turned her head and studied it with deep worry. Not too long ago she wouldn't have paid such a harmless device as a metronome any attention at all. By now, however, she knew that in Guerrero's hands, everything could turn into an instrument of torture. The small monitor attached to her pulse oximeter started showing high peaks in rapid succession once again.

He set the metronome in motion and its steady clack filled the eerie silence between them. After yesterday's experience with the ticking of the alarm clock, Ilsa understood despite her increasingly dazed state immediately what it was good for – the metronome offered her swirling thoughts orientation. They could settle down with its rhythm, cling to it and follow it. She couldn't let that happen – if she allowed an outside force to organize her thoughts, she was wide open to any kind of questioning. With great effort, she called up the image of Chance again.

Guerrero, meanwhile, placed a chair right in front of her and sat down. "And now boss", he said, "you're going to tell me why you really wanted to undergo this training."

Ilsa let out a sharp hiss. He could have asked all sorts of things: Her computer passwords, her bank account numbers, the combination of the safe in her apartment, but no, he had to ask _this_, aiming straight at the secret she was most intent to keep. Damn, he really knew her well.

At least the pain-based barrier he had constructed on the first day held: She didn't blurt out her knowledge immediately. Instead she managed to concentrate on the lines of Chance's tattoo, although it took all strength she could muster.

"My foolish mistake with the thio-contaminated wine almost blew the job." She fought hard to keep her voice steady. "I don't want that to happen again."

"Bullshit, boss. The job with the wine was months ago. Why didn't you come to me back then? Why now? What changed?" Guerrero's voice was completely in tone with the metronome now. So tempting…

The whole story was crouching on the tip of her tongue, only waiting to be spilt. Maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to tell him after all? Maybe it was a harmless misunderstanding altogether? Guerrero could surely clear the whole issue up in no time…

Ilsa took a deep breath and focused on the tattoo with all her might.

But what if it wasn't harmless? What if her worst fears proved correct? She was pretty sure Guerrero would agree not to tell Chance, would most likely even help her to settle the issue and keep quiet about it forever, but it would be betrayal, at least from Chance's point of view, should he ever find out. And Chance had a way of finding things out…

The thing was: If she was really right, if it really wasn't harmless, Chance had already been betrayed enough. Should he, under whatever circumstances, ever discover that particular betrayal _and_ that his best friend hadn't told him about it, the knowledge of the double betrayal (not to mention her own role in the whole mess) would probably sent him into suicide.

"I can see that you're holding something back from me, boss."

To her great surprise, Chance's tattoo suddenly sprang to life – the dragon raised its head and flexed its wings right on the raddled piece of carpet between her and Guerrero.

"I'm still waiting for an answer, boss."

To Ilsa's even greater surprise, the dragon was joined by a tiger, exactly like the one Guerrero had tattooed on his left shoulder blade. Snarling and hissing, the creatures circled each other. The dragon swished its tail in a gesture of dominance. A split second later the tiger shot forward, snapping at the dragon's throat. The dragon shifted slightly and the tiger's attack missed, but its claws tore open one of the dragon's wings.

"I'm tired of being the damsel in distress. I want to be a real part of the team. This training seemed to me like a necessary move in that direction."

The tiger turned around and jumped forward again. The dragon was slightly off balance due to its injured wing and didn't react fast enough. This time the tiger managed to sink its teeth deep into the dragon's chest. The dragon roared with pain.

Guerrero snorted. "Remember what I told you, boss? The next step will be torture, so you better come up with something better."

The dragon used its strong tail to tie the tiger to its body, then rolled over and pinned it to the ground, despite the predator's teeth still buried deeply in its chest. Ilsa remembered the countless times Chance had fought for her, no matter how grave his injuries, no matter how high the risk of losing his life. Suddenly she knew what to tell Guerrero.

"I love Chance", she blurted out. "And I want to protect him. What if someone questions me about him?"

Guerrero studied her for a long moment. His icy blue eyes bore into her like razors.

"You're still not telling me the truth." He paused. "But it sounds logical, and that's the important thing."

Then he nodded in approval and let the hint of a smile spread across his face. "Training session successfully completed, boss."

The moment he cut the cable fixers, Ilsa collapsed. The full magnitude of the ordeal she had been through during the past three days hit her like a freight train. Guerrero pulled her towards his chest in what seemed to be an embrace.

"You can rest now", he said, produced a syringe and injected a sedative directly into her carotid artery.

The last thing on Ilsa's mind before she descended into deep, dreamless sleep, was one single sentence:

He _is_ worth it.

_**A/N: The "damsel in distress"-part was provided by tree979 - I hope you don't mind I used it! Thank you, Pin, for your comment! It means a lot to me!**_


	6. Chapter 6

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

When Ilsa woke up the next morning, she realized surprised – _pleasantly_ surprised, for a change – that she was lying in her own bed in the master bedroom of her apartment in San Francisco. She had no recollection whatsoever of how she had got in there but figured Guerrero must have found her keycard.

Ilsa didn't have much time to relish the fresh silk sheets, the perfect quietness surrounding her (no fighting couples next door!) or the cobweb free ceiling, though – a giant wave of nausea hit her full force only seconds after she had opened her eyes. She dashed out of bed and into the bathroom. Well, at least she was throwing up into her own, sparkling clean Italian style toilet now.

Hoping to reduce the pain from her stiff and sore muscles, she took a long, hot shower and allowed herself some extra time to get ready for the day. Unfortunately, her efforts weren't to much avail: She could hardly move. On the kitchen counter she found a note from Guerrero and a small pillbox. _"Soreness, stiffness and nausea are normal. If you throw up more than thrice, develop fever or your vision starts to swim significantly, call a doctor. These pills reduce the pain. P.S.: BURN THIS."_

_"Thrice?"_ Ilsa groaned in slight despair and took one of the pills. Feeling a little ridiculous, she burned the note in the kitchen sink.

The medicament indeed lessened the pain, but putting on high heels, walking into the office with her usual brisk walk and pretending that everything was perfectly normal, was out of the question. Chance would catch on in no time. She called Winston and told him she was jetlagged and would use the day to recover and get some foundation paperwork done.

Then she proceeded to place another call, one she had been planning to make ever since the magnitude of her discovery had dawned on her. She hadn't dared to undertake this step before the thiopental ordeal, but now that this precaution was taken, there was no reason to postpone it any longer.

Nevertheless she hesitated before she dialed the number. Was she really doing the right thing? Wouldn't it be better to let sleeping dogs lie? Only that this wasn't a sleeping dog matter, as the incident with Chance had undoubtedly proven. The disappointment and humiliation that had driven her to put Winston under pressure washed over Ilsa as if it had been yesterday, bringing her to the edge of nausea again.

When she had told Guerrero she loved Chance she hadn't lied. She hadn't given him the truth that he had wanted, but she had spoken the truth. Otherwise the incident would have never hurt her so deeply.

Ilsa was well aware that the extra knowledge she possessed – should this indeed not be a harmless matter – also meant she was holding the key to making sure such an incident would never occur again. But would she use it? The price would be hurting him deeply. _Sounds like a tomorrow problem_, she thought, only then realizing that she had unconsciously quoted Chance.

She made the telephone call.

The day passed by slowly and she spent it more or less lying flat down on the couch, a cool washcloth pressed to her forehead. In late afternoon a text message from Chance arrived: _"Your presence is urgently needed at the office."_

She knew, in the case of a real emergency, he would phrase that completely differently.

_"Unless someone is dead, it's not "urgent"_, she texted back.

_"Ames was kidnapped & they want a ransom." _

_"G. can give them the password to my Swiss bank account. Let them take what they think is appropriate." _

_"Still jetlagged?"_

_"Mightily." _

After that, no new message came and Ilsa was just about to think he had given up when she sensed someone looking at her. She glanced up and saw Chance standing in the doorway of the living-room, boyish smile on his face. "If the mountain doesn't come to the prophet…", he said.

He was hiding behind his best Charming Chance façade, but she could see he was anxious about her reaction. She decided not to ease his apprehension right away.

"How in the world did you get in here?" She quickly checked the sleeves of her leisure suit. What if he saw the marks that the catheters had left?

"Guerrero has a copy of your keycard." He bent down to kiss her on the forehead, then placed a picnic basket on the floor next to the coffee table. "For safety reasons only, of course."

"Of course", she repeated, torn between being worried about him seeing her like that and being touched by his appearance. She had to admit, he was quite cute when he felt guilty.

"You don't look well at all", he observed. "You sure it's just jetlag?"

"Maybe a light case of food poisoning, too. Those oysters they served at the reception had a quite intense aftertaste."

"Oh." He looked crestfallen.

God, he was so cute. Like a sad puppy.

"I think it has passed by now", she quickly added. "I'm already feeling a lot better. Hungry, actually."

Chance practically beamed with happiness that his plan wasn't thwarted. "Well, in that case…" He opened the basket, produced, with the grandeur of an upper-class restaurant waiter, a checkered tablecloth, two candles, even napkins!, and laid them carefully out. Then he retrieved plates, glasses, flatware, a bottle of red wine and finally various take-away boxes with Italian food.

Ilsa was fighting hard to suppress the laughter that was building up inside of her. "What is this?"

Still in full swing of his waiter role, he put on an Italian accent: "_Antipasti_: Bruschetta and Parmesan Cheese with Balsamic Reduction." He held up a box. "_Primo_: Bucatini All'Amatriciana." He held up another box. "_Secondo_: Brasato Al Barolo. _Contorni_: Italian Side Salad. And for _Dolce_: Tartufo. I'd better put that into the fridge, though."

Now, wasn't she happy she had burned Guerrero's note?

She passed on the wine, not sure how well it would mix with Guerrero's pill, but the food was delicious and she could see Chance becoming more relaxed by the minute. Ilsa knew how much he hated verbal confrontations. Coming here, not knowing what to expect, must have cost him a lot. "Did you choose this particular menu combination for a reason?", she asked

"It was directly inspired by the book "Eat Pray Love"."

Now _that_ was too much. Ilsa burst into hearty laughter, spraying her all'Amatriciana sauce all over him.

"Tell Ames she chose well!"

He wiped his face with a napkin. "What gave me away?"

"That's a _chick_ book!"

Now Chance had to laugh at one of his friend's trademark expressions coming from her. "You're spending too much time around Guerrero."

Ilsa choked over her mineral water. "Eat Pray _Love_, hm?", she asked quickly, hoping he hadn't noticed.

"_Love_", Chance repeated. "I love _you_, Ilsa." He leaned over to her and started covering her face with soft kisses. His touch seemed to make her skin glow and she wanted nothing more than to give herself to him, to finally complete what they had started a week ago, to become fully his, but – oh damn – if she let this continue any further he would inevitably see the marks on her arms. She pulled back. "I'm sorry, but…"

"I understand. I'm still on probation." There was this hurt puppy expression again.

"No, that's not it. I'm not mad at you. I'm really not. I just think we should take our time." What a bullshit!

Suddenly his expression changed. Only a vague shift, but she could see suspicion rising in his eyes. "Why are you not mad at me? Every normal woman would be."

"Well, I do hope you don't consider me _normal_", she retorted, hopefully not too fast. "Come here, take me in your arms." She made room on the sofa for him and he embraced her. Safe and sound at his chest, Ilsa quickly drifted off to sleep. Chance, on the other hand, was wide awake. Carefully, so he wouldn't wake her up, he lifted first her left, then her right hand, gently pulled back the sleeves and studied the marks on both her arms. Catheters. Definitely. And the thin lines directly around her wrists looked like traces of cable fixer.

Anger and deep worry burnt through his whole body. Whoever had done this to her would pay for it. But why was she keeping something like that from him?


	7. Chapter 7

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

_**A/N: An extended (= smut) version of this chapter can be found in the M section. Mature eyes only, please!**_

In retrospect, Ilsa would look back at the week that followed her "training session" with Guerrero and think of it as the calm before the storm. Of course, just like slight tremors before a major earthquake, there were warning signs that the shit was about to hit the fan. Chance had told Guerrero about the marks on Ilsa's arms and was digging around madly, trying to find out what had happened to her, while his friend, seemingly assisting him, did his best to conceal the truth from him. So much for not forcing Guerrero into the role of a betrayer…

But all in all, things were taking their normal course. A new job came in, someone was trying to kill a coma patient, and preventing that turned out to be a lot trickier than it sounded. They ended up blowing a giant hole into a wall of Saint Francis Memorial. The successful wrap up of this job (if you can call it "successful" when the client is still in coma and not likely to ever wake up) called for strong alcoholic beverage. They spent the night sitting together, all of them, in the office, drinking, bantering back and forth, trying not to think about how fragile life is and how one misstep can shatter everything to pieces. No one actually voiced it, but the sight of their client, reduced to human vegetable years ago in a bike accident, had shaken them deeply.

The next morning, when Ilsa woke up with a major hangover, she found a text message from _him_ on her mobile. He told her he had found something and would place an envelope underneath a trash can in Nob Hill after sunset. God, Ilsa hated such ridiculous spy games. Why didn't he just send it to her via e-mail or cycle courier or whatever? He didn't reply to her request to have the material delivered to her, however, and so there was no way around it, she had to go and collect it herself.

Another reeking, dark alley for her within less than two weeks. Great.

"Why does it have to be a garbage can in a seedy environment?", she thought grumpily as she bent down to retrieve the envelope. "Why not a fountain in a park or a bench in a museum? And why after sunset?" At the very moment she realized that bending down in a rarely frequented alley after dark was an extremely vulnerable position, something cold pressed against her neck. Ilsa froze. It was the muzzle of a gun.

"This, boss, is what happens when you nose around in Chance's past."

"Guerrero?"

"I can't believe you hired _Harry_ to find out about Katherine Walters."

"Where is Harry?"

"In Mexico, if he knows what's good for him. Do you realize every time someone hires somebody to investigate Chance or anyone connected with Chance, word goes out to me? It's a bribe-based alert system, one of the precautions I've installed to keep him safe."

Ilsa took a deep breath. With all the spying Guerrero did, she should have known.

"What happens now?"

"You're going to tell me what this is all about."

When Ilsa didn't reply, Guerrero let out an irritated sigh. He really liked her, but she did cause a lot of trouble lately.

"We're going to move this discussion elsewhere."

Before she knew what was happening, he pulled a hood over her head and handcuffed her (no more cable fixers! Chance was already alert enough). With more or less subtle nudges and shoves, he directed her out of the alley and to his car. Ilsa knew better than to struggle. She really didn't -on top of everything else she had been through this month- need to be knocked unconscious with a hit to the head. When she heard him open the trunk, she climbed in voluntarily. The handcuffs slightly hampered her and he grabbed her by the hips and helped her in.

"Can't let you ride in the front seat with the hood on, boss", he explained.

When he removed the hood after what felt like an eternity later, she found herself sitting at a kitchen table in an unknown apartment. The curtains in front of the windows were firmly drawn, no sound was coming in from outside. No chance to figure out where she was. Guerrero unlocked the handcuffs and offered her a cup of tea.

"Where are we?"

"My place."

"The one you keep the address secret?"

"Drink your tea."

Ilsa rolled her eyes at him in an "I'm not THAT stupid" imitation of Ames' favorite expression and Guerrero couldn't help but smile. "I don't need thio to make you talk, Ilsa. The tea isn't spiked. Drink it and then tell me how you came to know about Katherine Walters."

She sipped at the tea. Spiked or not, she would have to tell Guerrero the truth. He would not let her go without knowing and after last weekend's experience she really didn't want to find out what he would do when he seriously wanted a certain piece of information.

"About a week before our "training session", Chance and I met in a hotel. It was supposed to be "the" night and we…"

"That part really necessary?"

"Don't be ridiculous. You made me vomit, put needles in my arms and exposed part of my chest to give me electric shocks, but the idea of Chance and me having intercourse makes you _uncomfortable_?"

"Everybody has limits."

Ilsa's chest clenched as the events of that night replayed in her mind.

_"A hotel room in Colma…", he breathed in her ear. "Neutral ground for both of us. What do you think?" His lips brushed against her jaw line in a flurry of kisses and she couldn't do anything but moan in agreement. _

_Their mutual desire was so strong, Ilsa wouldn't have objected to being taken then and there on the rug in the middle of the office and Chance surely would have loved doing exactly that. But they had danced around each other for months, the road up till this point had been so steep and rocky… They both felt the respective other deserved something special for their first night together – a non-memory-contaminated place where they needn't fear that anyone walked in on them, assaulted them or interrupted them with telephone calls. A safe haven, at least for a couple of hours._

_The drive to the hotel seemed to last forever and when they finally arrived in their suite they tore at each other with fierce kisses. Till Chance decided to take over the reins, that is. Grunting, he pinned her to the thick carpet right in front of the fireplace, ignoring the inviting queen-size bed for now. "Shhh", he whispered. "This is too good to be wasted in a rush." The way he looked at her was so full of love and desire, she practically melted underneath him. They locked for a long, passionate kiss. _

_"Katherine", he groaned. _

"We kissed and he called me Katherine", Ilsa told Guerrero.

Guerrero made an uncharacteristic hissing sound. "Oh dude… Not cool."

She fought to keep her voice steady. Two weeks had passed and it still hurt like hell. "He said it was someone who died a long time ago, but I wanted to know more. So I went to Winston."

"Why Winston? Why not me?"

"Winston I could put under pressure."

Guerrero arched his eyebrows in surprise.

"I told Michele about the Chance incident. Everybody has a pressure point…" Ilsa winced at the quote. This life and the people connected with it were slowly invading her vocabulary, her subconsciousness… and it was, as the Chance incident and her reaction to it had made more than obvious, way too late for her to turn away. She loved him. With all consequences, apparently. "Divorce or no divorce, Michele is still Winston's", she continued, slightly trembling.

"Nothing like solidarity among women…" Guerrero had his fair share of experience with that. At the end of their relationship the girl in Osaka had teamed with… long story. "So, Winston told you about Katherine. Wasn't that enough information? What did you need Harry for?"

Ilsa emptied her cup of tea. It had grown cold and bitter. "It was _too much_ information", she said darkly. "He showed me a picture."

Guerrero tilted his head. "I don't understand."

"I've seen her before, Guerrero. Two years ago."


	8. Chapter 8

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

Undecidedly, Chance weighed the bottle of wine in his hands. Should he really?

He had spent a week trying to figure out what had happened to Ilsa and found more questions than answers.

It was driving him _crazy_.

Once again he went through the timeline he had established so far:

On _Thursday afternoon_ Ilsa had announced that she would spent the weekend in Europe. The Italian ambassador in France had invited her to a reception at the embassy in Paris. Apparently the Marshall Pucci Foundation was helping several Italian charity organizations to deal with the refugee situation in Lampedusa and this was intended as a way to say thank you.

On _Friday morning_ she had sent Chance a short text message, informing him that she was expecting a very busy weekend and he shouldn't worry, shouldn't her hear from her. He had read that as a sign that she was angry with him over the Katherine issue and wanted to let him stew.

On _Monday morning_ Ilsa had called Winston and told him she was jetlagged and wouldn't come to the office. Again he had read that as a symptom of anger –and honestly, he couldn't blame her – so he had devised a plan to calm the waves a little. With the help of Ames he had chosen the food and packed the picnic basket.

On _Monday afternoon_ he had visited her in her apartment and discovered the marks on her arms.

The catheter marks had been of different color shades, indicating that she had obtained them at different points in time, first on the left arm, then, if he was not completely mistaken, about 24 hours later, on the right arm. The cable fixer traces were freshest; on Monday they had still been red. She must have gotten them on Sunday at the latest.

Chance had checked with the airport: The jet had left San Francisco on Friday morning and according to the airport's computer data she had been on board. Well, in that case she must have teleported herself into the airplane, for the surveillance cameras in the hangar showed no Ilsa arriving or boarding the plane whatsoever. He had also checked with the Italian embassy – yes, Mrs. Pucci had indeed been on the invitation list and according to the computer data she had also appeared. But when Chance spoke with the ambassador, posing as a lawyer from the Marshall Pucci Foundation, it turned out Ilsa had sent Connie to attend.

Had he seen only the catheter marks, he would have assumed some sort of medical treatment she didn't want him to worry about. Even the fact that somebody had obviously tampered with the airport's and the embassy's computer data could be interpreted that way. The cable fixer marks on her wrists, however, told a totally different story, one he just couldn't figure out.

Which brought him back to the crucial question whether he should drug the woman he loved – and yes, he did love her, although he had to admit, the Katherine incident hadn't exactly lent credence to that – with sodium thiopental or not. Since she had only been exposed to the substance once, her tolerance level was low and a tiny dose, just enough to make her a little chatty, would be entirely sufficient.

Should he really?

Cable fixers spelt trouble of the VERY deep kind and the marks around her wrists had been very distinct. There was no way to get such cuts except through fixation, when the plastic scraped against the skin. What had happened to her?

God, he could kick himself all day long for that lapse with Katherine's name. If he could only explain to her… but it had taken him sleepless nights and several "let's say a friend of mine"-conversations with Winston to work it out himself, finding the words to actually lay the whole mess out for someone else was out of question. He just couldn't.

He had known Katherine only for a very short time, but she had been the one to give all his doubts, all his nagging questions about the way he lived his life, a solid ground. Meeting her, meeting one truly innocent person, had made it possible for him to finally severe his ties with the Old Man, walk away from the life he knew and start all over again. Winston had helped him greatly, but with Katherine, it had all begun.

Everything he had done in the past six and a half years eventually boiled down to Katherine. Whenever he had been about to lose his footing, to get lost in his instincts and tempted to turn back to his old ways with some particularly nasty opponent, the memory of her had steadied and equilibrated him again. She had given his life purpose and a promise of peace.

Just like Ilsa now.

And that was the reason he had called her Katherine – not because he wished she was Katherine or missed her so much, no! He had called her by the name he connected with safety. Not literal safety, for that they had been jumping out of tall buildings way too often lately, but trust-wise.

His slowly eroding trust in the Old Man had been one of the main reasons he had started questioning his life. In fact it had been one of the first things he had told Winston: _"Co-workers I can't trust…"_ Katherine he had trusted. Guerrero and Winston now, too, sure, but the trust into Katherine had been something deeper. I had been unearned trust, given from a truly innocent being to a truly rotten soul. Katherine had led him into his new life as Christopher Chance and Ilsa had brought him back into it. His instinct-ruled mind, dizzy with the prospect of finally, finally coming to full circle with Ilsa, had melted the two persons who held his life together into one.

Oh boy, this sounded so sappy, he could never spill any of this out for Ilsa.

Speaking of Guerrero, however… Ilsa surely hadn't tampered with the computer data on her own. Maybe he should have a word with his friend…

At this very moment, the doorbell rang, indicating that someone downstairs was asking to be let into the warehouse. Chance frowned. It was past midnight. The team members all had keycards and thugs didn't ring door bells. He checked the surveillance cameras.

What he saw – whom he saw – shocked him to the core. For a long moment he just stared at the monitors. Then he activated the entrance door's release control. While he waited for the elevator to slowly ride upwards, he grabbed his cell phone and sent Guerrero a distress message.

Cell phone still in hand, he froze as the elevator doors slid open.

Carmine, who had been sleeping on the couch in his living quarters, came dashing down the stairs, joyfully yelping, almost knocking over the visitor. Chance was lost for words. He couldn't believe his eyes, he just couldn't.

_This was impossible. _

When the dog had finally calmed down, she straightened herself, bit her lip and looked at him. "I've got a confession to make", she whispered.

Guerrero read Chance's message, briefly tilted his head backwards in a gesture of exasperation and showed Ilsa the text.

"Just when you think things can't get more complicated."

_**A/N: Thank you to all my anonymous reviewers and those who put this story on alert, I can't stress enough how much that means to me! **_


	9. Chapter 9

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

San Francisco was known for its earthquakes, but this particular night was tremor-free. For everyone but Chance, that is. His world was shaken to its very foundations.

"I was 32 years old, single, with a shoebox apartment downtown and a job that wouldn't get me anywhere. When this guy, Brunner, approached me, it seemed like the perfect opportunity to break free from everything", Katherine explained, slightly trembling. She kept throwing unsure glances at the team.

_"Solid ground"_, Chance thought bitterly and nipped at his drink.

"Stealing the book from Joubert seemed so easy – he wouldn't call the police, right? And Brunner already had buyers who had paid him part of the money in advance… But then Brunner got shot, right in front of me." She shuddered at the memory.

_"Truly innocent."_ Chance took another sip at his drink.

"I wanted to disappear right after his death, but the police was on site way too fast and put me into witness protection. Then you came along and I figured it would be easier to get away from you than from them. When you left me alone on that boat, I fled as soon as you were out of sight. I was already running when it exploded."

_"Trust." _

Winston studied Chance carefully. Self-reproaches about leaving Katherine alone on that boat had eaten away at him for years, playing a big part in his unnerving habit to throw himself into the line of fire of every gun available. He felt deep hostility building up inside of him, a feeling he had never thought possible in connection with Katherine.

A feeling that was, unbeknownst to him, shared by Ilsa. One look at Chance's face, the way his jaw line was set, the way he stared into his glass with opaque eyes, and she knew he was terribly upset. Just like she had feared he would be.

"At first I thought I'd just keep on living like I did before, only at another place, but the …guilt… about being part of a crime, about betraying you, didn't leave me alone. I joined a charity organization and started working in Asia."

Ilsa nodded. "That's how we met. Marshall and I visited one of our projects in Bangladesh and you were introduced to us. As a member of the logistic team, if I remember correctly?"

"Doesn't explain why you're here now", Guerrero stated. They all recognized that tone. It was usually reserved for interrogation; interrogation with the help of a certain tackle box…

Chance wasn't sure if he liked Guerrero's attitude towards Katherine. She had betrayed him, yes. But on the other hand this was _Katherine_. The be-all and end-all without whom he wouldn't be here right now but most likely still running with the Old Man.

"Someone poked around, a private eye named Harry something. That alerted the buyers from six and a half years ago – they became aware of the fact that I'm still alive and they threatened me – they want the book they paid for or they'll kill me."

_"Harry?"_, Ames asked incredulously. "Clumsy white guy, balding, rather nerdy and talks too much?"

"That's the way he was described to me, yes."

"We need to talk to him. Find out who hired him." Chance put down his empty glass.

"Last thing I've heard, dude ran off to Mexico. Someone scared him", Guerrero said.

"Can't we just give the buyers the book?", Katherine timidly addressed him. Last time they met he had been planning to kill her, after all.

"The book was destroyed some months ago, when we rescued Winston from one of the parties incriminated by its content." Guerrero studied her reaction carefully. She was shocked.

"So there's no chance for me to get out of this mess?"

"It's our job to save people", Ilsa stated calmly, trying hard to keep the edge out of her voice. She didn't like the way Chance looked at Katherine. Not at all. She wasn't jealous, mind you – that was the least of her concerns right now. She could see Chance slowly slipping into "fanatic" mode; the same mode he had been in most of the time during the ordeal with that South American freedom fighter, Maria. In this mode he was inaccessible for reasonable argumentation and solely focused on his recent crusade of choice, no matter how high his personal risk.

Unbeknownst to her, Guerrero shared her worries. He could see Chance slowly losing it; he was still in the first stages, but things could get very worse, very fast in the blink of an eye. "We should follow the money Brunner was paid in advance. That'll lead us to the buyers and then we can decide what to do next."

They all agreed this was the way to go. Outside, dawn was breaking. Since they had all had very little sleep during the night, they decided to get some rest and come together for a first meeting in late afternoon. Chance told Katherine she could stay at the office, he would keep an eye on her. He locked eyes with Ilsa, wondering if she would object.

_"I trust you"_, the look on her face said and he was relieved. Relationship issues were the last thing he needed right now.

Katherine retreated to the spare bedroom next to his own and he curled up on the couch, a strategically more advantageous position, should anyone go after her. It was unlikely, though. The buyers were still under the impression she was in the process of retrieving the book. Why should they strike now? Given this relatively stable state of affairs he should have gotten some hours of if not peaceful, then at least undisturbed, sleep. Instead he kept weaving in and out of consciousness, a vague thought not leaving him alone. He couldn't quite grab it, it was elusive and hazy, but there was something that was bothering him deeply.

Past noon, he suddenly snapped out of sleep with one clear realization on his mind.

_Guerrero. Oh damn, Guerrero. _

Only then he noticed Katherine in a bathrobe standing by his side.

**_A/N: A big thank you to tree979 for reading through my rather lengthy outline of the chapters to come and giving very helpful feedback!_**


	10. Chapter 10

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

"_Just when you think things can't get more complicated"_, Chance thought, taking in Katherine's appearance. She was wearing his bathrobe, too big for her and thus making for a generous cleavage. But pretty much like years back in the cabin she came across as innocent, lost, in need of help and the only thing he felt stir was his protective instinct.

Or so he told himself.

She sat down on the couch and he couldn't but move over and make room for her. She practically melted against his body, shivering, seeking comfort. He put an arm around her and she snuggled further into him, closing her eyes.

"Your kiss haunted me for years", she whispered. "I lied to you from the very first moment we met, I know. But our good-bye wasn't a lie. _That kiss_ wasn't a lie. Uganda, Romania, Bangladesh, it followed me everywhere like a constant reminder of what could have been, had I been honest. More than anything else your kiss made me realize how wrong I had gone. I'm so sorry…"

Chance deeply inhaled the scent of her hair brushing against his face. All his anger about her playing him like schoolboy, all his doubts about the past six years evaporated, leaving nothing but the burning desire to keep her safe at all costs.

"Isn't it ironic?", she breathed. "All I want now is my old life back. No more illusions of fulfilling farfetched dreams. I want what you offered back then and I didn't take. I want safety, Chance, nothing else." She turned around in his arms and he found himself face to face with her.

_Literally_ face to face. As in "eyelashes fluttering against skin"- face to face.

One inch closer and it would be skin against skin.

_"Dude, not cool"_, an unexpected voice of reason in the back of his mind chimed in.

Chance froze, for two reasons:

Firstly, ILSA. Of course.

Secondly - _Guerrero. Oh damn, Guerrero. _Chance suddenly remembered what his unconsciousness had figured out while he had been lost in fitful sleep.

"You will be safe", he told Katherine. "Get dressed, we're going to pay somebody a visit."

… … …

"Dude, do I look as if I wanted visitors?" Guerrero welcomed them with a gun, silencer screwed on.

"We need to talk." Chance wasted no time on niceties.

Reluctantly, Guerrero opened the kitchen's door for them, already considering where he would move next. With Katherine knowing his address, there was no way he would stay here.

Pity, he had liked the view... something he definitely couldn't say about Katherine. She was messing with Chance's head – had been back then, was doing it now. Not a plus in his book, absolutely not.

"_We_'ll chat in the living-room." Chance placed a heavy hand on his friend's shoulder and steered him around, signaling Katherine to sit down at the kitchen table and wait.

Guerrero clenched his jaw.

_He knows._

Cursing inwardly the damn woman, he poured them drinks. Chance refused his. "You took the book in the chaos that ensued after the interrogator got shot, right? While I was busy defusing the bomb on Winston's chest, you collected it."

"I don't have it anymore, bro." Guerrero sipped at his drink, carefully studying his friend.

Chance snorted. He should have known. Guerrero had probably considered the money he cashed in for it as a compensation for all those years Winston and he hadn't been able to pay him properly.

Fair enough. But now he needed it back.

"Where is it?"

"We need to follow the money Brunner got paid, Chance."

"It's too vague a trace. We need the book. Katherine spend years trying to make up for what she did. She deserves redemption and the best way to get that is the book."

Guerrero shook his head.

Chance took a deep breath, staring at the still full glass on the table that his friend had offered him. "Don't do this, man."

"I'm not going to tell you where it is."

Chance grabbed the glass, broke off its rim, dove at Guerrero in the manner of a football tackle and pinned him to the ground, apparently trying to press the broken tumbler against his carotid artery and thus forcing the answer out of him.

Guerrero anticipated the move, tripped Chance while they were falling, grasped his wrist and wrested the glass out of his hand, sending it flying to a corner of the room. With a poke to the eyes he caused him to break away from him.

Chance was back on his feet in no time, but so was Guerrero. Chance lunged forward again, using his bigger height and weight as much as to his advantage as possible, while Guerrero tried to keep him at a distance. His kicks were his best defense, but he needed space to deliver them. Of course Chance knew that full well – he kept closing in, evading his friend's head butts, blocking his blows, attacking fiercely.

The look on Chance's face, however, hurt Guerrero more than any of his punches, even the devastating one he landed in his solar plexus. "He will feel guilty about this. Not today and not tomorrow, but he will feel guilty for this." And who, if not Guerrero, knew what a dangerous combination guilt and Chance were? He took a deep breath.

_There's no other way._

He let himself fall backwards to the floor in a gesture of defeat.

"Where is the book?", Chance asked again, breathing in painful gasps.

"I brought it back to the Old Man." Guerrero was gasping for air, too. Two of his ribs felt broken. A searing pain was shooting up and down his left leg. "In exchange for your safety. He promised to leave you alone if he got the book back. You can't retrieve it, bro. He'll go after you and he'll tear you apart. He'll destroy you. Don't touch it."

Chance stared at his friend – shocked, flabbergasted, steamrolled with conflicting emotions.

At this very moment, Katherine came in. She didn't say anything. She just looked at him and all of a sudden he was back in the cabin again, ready to shoot his best friend. She had reached out and touched his arm, wordlessly telling him that he wasn't a killer anymore, stopping him from making what would have been the worst mistake of his life.

Be-all and end-all.

He needed her to be safe. Everything else was secondary.

"He keeps chloroform in the kitchen cabinet", he told Katherine. "Get me the bottle and a cloth."

"I'm sorry", Katherine told Guerrero as she returned.

Chance didn't say a word as he kneeled down, pulled his friend's crumpled form upwards to his chest in a tight embrace and pressed the cloth against his face.

He didn't need to, though. Guerrero already knew he was sorry. Goddamn sorry for the whole mess.


	11. Chapter 11

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

Guerrero fought.

_Only a few more inches. _

Fatigue was rolling over him like a bulldozer. The room was spinning madly and a splitting headache was gripping him so hard that he felt ready to puke.

He needed to reach that phone.

Slowly, slowly, slowly he crawled forward. Unable to lift his head, he rubbed his face over the wooden floor whilst dragging himself towards his mobile.

Just letting go was so tempting.

_Close your eyes and go to sleep._

But Chance was on his way to face the Old Man. Joubert would kill him.

NO.

There it was, the damn thing. Guerrero stretched out his right arm. His fingertips brushed against the small device.

_Careful now, don't push it away. You won't master another inch. _

Agonizing pain shot through his whole body as he strained his muscles a little more to get a firm hold of the phone.

Yes. Finally.

Another intense wave of fatigue hit him like a freight train. His tongue became a fuzzy washcloth, refusing to cooperate. Guerrero realized he was only seconds away from complete blackout. Frantically, he hit Ilsa's number on speed dial.

… … …

"Chance isn't answering his phone", Winston grumbled. "I don't like this. Not at all."

They all knew what he meant. The office felt eerily empty.

"Maybe you should have stayed here", Ames told Ilsa. "To make sure he doesn't do anything… _stupid_."

Ames was talking about much more than just ensuring Chance wouldn't run off with Katherine to solve the case alone, and Ilsa knew. She bristled at the young woman daring to tell her how to handle her love life, but on the other hand she did feel the need to defend herself. Winston probably thought along the same lines.

"In my experience, Ms. Ames, if you love something, set it free. If it comes back to you, it's yours. If it doesn't, it never was. Mr. Chance is a grown man, fully capable of making conscious decisions."

Ames shot Ilsa a rather sullen look for lecturing her with something right out of the Book of Banalities, chapter one. "Yeah. Where I come from, we always add _If it doesn't come back, hunt it down and kill it_."

Before Ilsa could formulate an angry retort, her mobile rang. Ilsa glanced at the display. "It seems at least one of our missing persons grants us the knowledge of his whereabouts." She answered the phone and put Guerrero on speaker. What they heard next made their blood freeze.

"Chance is heading to confront the Old Man. STOP HIM."

That message alone was terrifying, but what was even worse was the way Guerrero sounded. They could hardly make out the words. He was breathing heavily, as if in a lot of pain.

"Where are you?" Ilsa was shouting and didn't even notice it.

"My place", was all Guerrero managed to say before he finally passed out.

"Please tell me one of you knows his address!" Ilsa turned to Ames and Winston as the phone went dead, but both shook their heads. "Then trace his mobile!"

Winston shook his head again. "Untraceable. It's _Guerrero _we're talking about. No chance in hell we find him."

"We should go to New York a.s.a.p. and try to save Chance and Katherine", Ames agreed.

Now it was Ilsa's turn to vigorously shake her head. "You did hear him, didn't you? Something is wrong with him! He sounded hurt, he lost consciousness. With the jet we can compensate Chance's and Katherine's head start. Guerrero needs our help immediately."

"We can't help him if we don't know where he is", Winston pointed out once more. He would have never admitted it, but he hated the thought of Guerrero lying somewhere, blacked out, defenseless, vulnerable… On the other hand, Chance was running into his doom, open-eyed. They were both in danger, but with Chance they at least knew where to look. And time was pressing…

"I might have an idea", Ilsa said.

… … …

"Do I even want to know why you rode to Guerrero's place in the trunk of his car?" Winston was still not sure if he had understood her correctly. They were in the alley in Nob Hill, gathered around the trash can where Guerrero had waited for her.

Ilsa decided to ignore his question. "The point is, I can't reconstruct the route while sitting in the front of the car. It's worse enough that it's so early in the day. Last time I was here it was after sunset."

Again, Winston couldn't believe what he was hearing. Ilsa had gone to this dangerous place in the dark? However, before he could say anything, Ilsa put a paper bag over her head – they hadn't been able to get a real hood in the shortness of time.

"Okay." Ilsa took a deep breath. "First he turned me to the right and then we walked straight ahead for about twenty or thirty steps."

With Ames' experience as a driver of getaway cars and Winston's cop eyes, they managed to figure out where Guerrero had parked his car surprisingly quickly. But the real challenge was yet to come. As Ilsa climbed into the trunk of Winston's car, equipped with an earpiece so she could direct Ames at the steering wheel, she couldn't help but notice how much smaller it was then Guerrero's.

"Jesus Christ, how did it come from _absentee ownership_ to this?", she thought, trying to steady herself as the car started moving. "Ilsa Pucci, billionaire and society lady, judging cars by the size of their trunk!"

At this time of day the streets were still jammed with traffic. Ilsa did her best to figure out when and where Guerrero had made turns by the way she was rolling back and forth, but the constant stop and go that was forced upon Ames made orientation extremely difficult. And the noises were completely different.

Not to mention a lot louder…

"What is this infernal noise?", she shouted via earpiece.

"A jackhammer", Winston explained. "They're still repairing the hole we blew into Saint Francis Memorial. Sorry for stopping right next to the workers, but the traffic light..."

"Hang on a second, at the end of a workday they sound some kind of siren at a construction site, don't they? I've been here with Guerrero! Turn right!"

They followed Pine Street right to its end. On Presidio Avenue, directly in front of SFFD museum, all hell had broken lose. Apparently some idiots had cracked open four fire hydrants _and _broken the mechanism to shut them down again. Some prank. Ames got caught right in the middle of the turmoil, huge jets of water raining down on Winston's car.

"Erm, Mrs. Pucci…", Winston began timidly, "…one of our jobs left a bullet hole or two in the trunk lid of my car. I've been meaning to repair that for ages…"

"Never mind", Ilsa replied through clenched teeth as the water dripping through the holes soaked the paper bag and caused it to stick to her face.

They got totally lost at the junction of Masonic Avenue and Geary Boulevard: "Turn right! No, left, left! That feels wrong, too… I think it was right after all…" In the end they got pulled over by a police car.

"Winston! Long time no see. How're you doing?"

Winston cringed inwardly. Officer Thomas, of all people! The most persnickety man on the force. He would sure as hell check the trunk… He had to come up with some credible explanation for Ames swiveling back and forth – FAST.

"Enjoying retirement! Friends asked me to teach this young lady how to drive…"

The officer broke into hearty laughter. "Driving lessons! So you were missing the excitement and adrenaline rush of your cop days, hm? Well, from what I've seen teaching her surely will compensate for that! Aren't you a bit old to take driving lessons, though?" He was still amused, but persnickety Thomas was also a very thorough man and he couldn't help himself but something was fishy about Winston and his companion.

Ames was trying very hard to look every bit as overwhelmed and geeky as she imagined a girl learning to drive at her age (She had hotwired her first car at the age of twelve!) would look.

"She's from L.A. where it's easier to use public transportation than drive your own car, but now she'll be moving to Wisconsin…"

"And you've decided to wreak havoc on the streets of San Francisco first?" Thomas still wasn't completely convinced. But on the other hand this was _Winston_. He had found friends in high places lately. A billionaire, if he had heard correctly. Thomas wasn't only persnickety, he was also career-orientated. Better not risk something over a vague hunch. He let them go.

"I remember where we went!", Ilsa told them the second the officer had disappeared again.

They spent another hour driving up and down various streets till Ilsa was finally convinced she had led them to the right place. They were all tensed up as hell - the clock was ticking, for both Chance and Guerrero. Nevertheless seeing where their paperchase had brought them made them all laugh.

"You've got to be kidding me!" Ames couldn't believe it. They were standing in front of an apartment building in walking distance of the office.

It was Guerrero they were talking about...

Finding the correct floor was easy – Ilsa had been very nervous, not to say frightened, about the upcoming conversation with Guerrero and to calm herself down she had counted the steps of the stairwell he had forced her to climb. She had also counted her steps to his door, clinging to the numbers to fight her rising panic.

They expected Guerrero's door to be booby trapped somehow, but as it turned out it wasn't even locked. Guerrero was lying on the floor of what appeared to be his living-room, unconscious. Both Ilsa and Winston rushed to his side to check his vital signs, but Ilsa was faster. As she pulled him upright to make sure he was still breathing he made a gurgling sound and threw up.

Never had Ilsa been happier to be puked upon.

He was alive.

**_A/N: Thank you, Bob, for taking the time to leave a comment. I appreciate your open words and I'm sorry for disappointing you. Thank you, Dreaming Sio, for helping with the "driving lessons" part, that was really great of you! _**


	12. Chapter 12

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

Guerrero emerged from the depth of drug-induced sleep like a drowning man from swirling water. In fact his face _was _wet, the collar of his shirt was soaked and he was coughing up liquid. Someone was dabbing at his lips and chin with a… napkin?

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!", Ames squeaked, hectically trying to contain the mess she had produced. "You were coughing in your sleep, as if your throat had gotten dry and I thought a glass of water… I'm sorry I spilt it, but you moved so suddenly…."

Guerrero wrested the napkin from her hand and felt for his glasses. "Where are we?"

"On the jet in a hangar in New York. You overslept the whole flight." Ames refilled the empty glass and timidly offered it to him.

Slowly Guerrero regained his orientation. "Chance? Katherine?" He accepted the glass from Ames and took a sip.

"We figured out a plan to save them. Ilsa and Winston are already executing it." Ames studied Guerrero carefully. When the effect of the chloroform had begun to wear of, he had started tossing and turning badly in his sleep, groaning, mumbling. Only one word had been intelligible in the midst of all his muttering. _Junior. _He must have had nightmares about someone threatening his kid.

"And they left you behind? They're going up against the Old Man and not taking all the firepower they can get? What kind of plan is that?"

Ames explained the plan to Guerrero. "Nobody was terribly happy about it, but…"

Guerrero stopped her with a shake of his head. "It's a good plan."

"You think it will work? It's so different from what we usually do."

"What we usually do won't work here. Not with the Old Man." Guerrero looked around. "Anyone bring my mobile?"

Ames handed it to him.

"I asked Sergej to try and retrace the money Brunner received. Let's see if he's come up with something…"

"Aren't you angry with Chance?" Ames had spent a good part of the flight cooling Guerrero's terribly swollen ankle and the bruises above his ribcage.

"Chance is an idiot when it comes to chicks. _Maria_. Need I say more? And Katherine is a million times worse…" He checked his messages and suddenly froze. His face turned into an unreadable mask. Ames had that face before and learned to fear it. He showed her the message he had received.

Ames needed to read it twice before she fully grasped its meaning and still didn't want to believe it. "This is really bad. We need to tell Winston and Ilsa!"

She reached for her mobile, but Guerrero grabbed her wrist and stopped her in midair. "No, we don't. The plan will work or it won't. That extra-knowledge doesn't change a thing."

"But…"

He struggled to his feet and hobbled over to Winston's notebook, silencing her with one very distinct look. For the next twenty minutes he silently worked on the computer, fingers flying over the keyboard. His facial expression didn't change once, but when the twenty minutes were over, a small, eerie smile stole over his face. He got up and headed for the jet's door.

Ames got up, too. "Where are you going?"

He replied with a classic "Come on, dude, it's not _that_ difficult"-look.

She turned pale. "You do remember that nobody deserves to die, don't you?"

"That's Chance's motto, not mine." But deep down, Guerrero had to admit she was right. This whole damn mess was about Chance accepting what he had been and being proud of what he had become. Murder would forever prevent that from happening.

To Ames' great relief, he slowly nodded. Then he started heading for the door again. "I can't recall anyone saying anything about nobody deserving to learn a lesson…"

She knew exactly what he meant. And she also knew what she had to do. The next words didn't come easy to her. But what was the alternative? He was severely limping and in pain. He was vulnerable. She couldn't risk him getting overpowered, shot maybe, because he wasn't one hundred percent. "I'm going with you", she stated firmly.

Guerrero shook his head. "No. You're staying right here."

"You're hurt! You shouldn't drive so soon after the chloroform! Don't always treat me like a stupid kid. I can…"

He cut her off in mid-sentence, took her by the shoulders and, by his standards gently, pushed her into a seat. Holding her down with a firm grip, he lowered his face till it was level with hers, eyes burning into her. "I'm not leaving you behind because I think you're stupid or can't do this. I'm leaving you behind because I want to protect you. If you come with me you'll cross a line you can't come back from. It'll change you forever."

"You can hardly walk. You'll need help. We're in this together."

Guerrero was conflicted. He had always found her attempts at becoming a mini-him annoying but in a way touching. This was different. This was serious.

He locked eyes with her. Ames held his gaze. No, she wasn't a stupid kid.

_So be it._

**_A/N: Thank you, jack attack, for you encouraging words!_**


	13. Chapter 13

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

"And you're sure it's in there?", Katherine asked, still not quite convinced. She was antsy, fidgety, showing nerves. No surprise, though. They were about to break into a tiny fortress – security cameras, state of the art alarm system, guards…

"This was a bank in the 1920's. It's got a vault in the basement, a steel bar cell, securing two walls of fireproof lockboxes." Chance was tense. It had been years since he had set foot into that building. He had no idea what extra security measures the Old Man had installed in the meantime. "Joubert used to keep all his valuables here. I know it's vague, but he had no real reason to move his stuff – I was running from him, not attacking him and a place as suitable as this is hard to find."

To be honest, Chance felt antsy himself. This was not the usual adrenaline surge he experienced before going into a job. Things felt out of kilter and the problem was not simply that he had no backup. He had embarked on this without his friends' blessing and that, as he realized only now, made a palpable difference.

It also didn't help that this place was loaded with memories. One day the Old Man had taken him down to the vault and opened the lockboxes for him, every single one of them. He had let him know his secrets… And in the end he had told him he wanted him to take over the reins of his business.

They had sat amongst the Old Man's treasures, drunk Whiskey and talked about the shit they had been through together… It had been a happy day, one of the happiest in Junior's life, way before he met Christopher Chance and things started getting complicated.

Katherine startled him from his thoughts. "How do we know which lockbox it will be?"

Chance turned to her with a grin: "I thought you might be able to help there…"

A couple of minutes later the guard in the former bank's entrance hall tensed and readied his weapon underneath his desk. A woman had timidly entered the building. She was fawn-eyed, looked uncertain and a little helpless. The guard, however, had been shot at too many times by innocent-looking creatures to soften up at the sight of a two-legged bambi.

"This is private property!", he barked.

"I'm terribly sorry, sir…", she began timidly, hovering near the entrance, obviously awed by the underlying violence the guard was radiating. "It's so ridiculous, but I got out of my car and my car key…" A shrill alarm sound, rather old-fashioned, probably another remnant from the building's days as a bank, cut her cover story off before she could embellish it any further.

The guard started yelling into his radio and ran down the hall. "Don't move!", he shouted at Katherine.

Yeah, sure.

The second he was gone, she sprinted over to the desk where he had been sitting and logged herself into the computer. With her experience in logistics it was easy to find the file with the overview of the lockboxes. Of course there was no description of their contents, that would have been too easy – _box 27 cocaine, box 28 gold ingots, box 29 secret book_. But Chance had told her the approximate timeframe in which the Old Man had gotten the book from Guerrero and yes, there it was! Box 71 had been taken into use exactly two days after the rescue of Winston.

Katherine quickly left as the guard rounded the corner with a squirming cat in his arms. "Stupid little thing", he cooed. "How did you get in here? Setting off the alarm, tsk, tsk, tsk. We could have shot you!"

Outside, Chance was waiting for her.

"I've got the number!"

She was beaming at him and Chance felt his heart skip a bit, shortly followed by a pang of conscience.

_What about Ilsa_?

Chance pushed the thought away. A tomorrow problem.

Under the screen of night he and Katherine returned, using the first floor window that Chance had manipulated as an entrance. From the surveillance they had conducted during the past few hours, Chance had been able to deduct the timetable of the guards' inspection rounds. To his utter surprise the building was not as heavily secured as he had expected. Maybe the Old Man was relying more on invisible security measures nowadays.

Or maybe he had become sloppy? Staying close together, Kathering bumping into Chance a few times, the two made their way to the vault without running into any kind of active laser beam fencing system, heat or motion detector. The keypads belonging to those systems weren't blinking, apparently they were turned off. What they found, however, were signs of building alteration – ladders, paint buckets, protective foils were strewn all along their way to the vault, as if a horde of handymen had rampaged around without actually starting to work.

Under normal circumstances this would have caught Chance's attention, but he was with _Katherine_ whom he had believed to be dead for almost seven years, he was missing Winston's voice in his ear and the knowledge that Guerrero was having his back, Ilsa was hopping around in his head and even Ames made a cameo appearance or two.

It slipped his notice.

The keypad on the vault, however, _was_ blinking. Carefully Chance started manipulating the lock, well aware of the fact that one wrong move could set the alarm off after all. He cursed at his clumsiness. Guerrero was so much better at this.

_Guerrero. _

Ever since they had left San Francisco Chance he hadn't been able to stop thinking about the way he had left him – unconscious, hurt… What if he reacted badly to the chloroform, threw up and choked on his own vomit? He had told Katherine to send Ilsa a text message with Guerrero's address, but that didn't stop his thoughts from becoming more guilt-ridden by the minute.

Chance cautiously linked two promising-looking wires. The door to the vault popped open.

Now _that _should have made him suspicious, shouldn't it? But it didn't. Too much guilt and conflicting impulses clouded his instincts.

Finding the correct box and cracking it was a piece of cake.

"That's it? That's really it?" Katherine stared at the leather-bound volume, wide-eyed.

Chance reached into the lockbox, took it and handed it to her. "Your freedom", he said. Katherine pressed it against her chest like a lost child. "Thank you", she whispered. "Thank you for everything." She stood up on her tiptoes, lifted her head and was just about to breath a kiss on Chance's lips when he turned his face away.

"I'm sorry", he said.

"No", she replied, and suddenly her tone became harder, more determined. "_I'm_ sorry." Apparently with all the strength she could muster, she pushed him backwards against the wall of lockboxes, ran out of the vault and slammed the door shut behind her. Chance, taken off-guard, lost his footing, banged his head and could only watch as she tossed the instruments he needed to manipulated the keypad out of his reach.

"I spent six years in the most godforsaken places of the world one can think of. And what did it bring me? Lice in my hair, fleas in my bed and more diarrheal diseases than I care to count! When the buyers found me again and put me under pressure to get the book, it was like a gift of God! Finally, finally I would be able to live the life I always wanted – the cars, the fancy clothes, the cocktails in the sunset on a yacht… Redemption is an illusion, Chance. And guilt is an education method, meant to keep kids in line. Someone did a very good job of installing that in you. I didn't even need to sleep with you…"

Chance was still lying crumpled against the wall of lockboxes. The shove she had given him hadn't been that bad. But her words… "I don't understand", he choked.

"I struck a deal with the buyers. They were afraid that you might try to get the book back, once I was out of danger. I bargained a little with them and they offered quite an impressive amount of money, should I manage to get rid of you. Well, I originally thought I'd have to kill you myself…" She showed him the gun she had taken from him while she had "accidentally" bumped into him on their way to the vault. "… but from what you've told me about the Old Man and judging from your freaky friend's desperate attempt to keep you away from him, I think I can safely wash my hands of it and leave you to him."

And thus she went, book cradled in her arms.

Had he still had his weapon, Chance wouldn't have ended everything right then and there. But she had left him trapped, helpless, like a rat in a hole.

_Redemption is an illusion, Chance. _He had thought he could somehow make things right again, if he helped people like Katherine. Innocents. But there was no innocence. No other way. He had always been as stuck as he had thought he was. Everything he had done was based on a lie. _Everybody deserves to die in the book of someone. _He had taught that to Baptiste, years ago, and the bitter truth of it sank into him again with full force.

"Hello, Junior."

Chance looked up. He had been so lost in his pain, he hadn't even noticed the Old Man coming in.

"So, Little Miss Perfect turned out to be not so perfect after all, did she?" Smirking, Joubert crouched by his side. For a long moment he said nothing and Chance did nothing. When the Old Man finally spoke up again, all traces of smirkiness were gone from his voice. He was very serious. "We all make mistakes, Junior. Wrong decisions, misjudgments… but I still remember the day in Nogales… Everybody thought you were dead, even Guerrero, but I knew you would make it. I knew you were the best. I was so proud of you when you got out of that car… Let's forget the past, Junior. _This_ is what you are. Accept it and come back to me. Hell, if you insist I'd even be willing to reemploy Guerrero…"

Maybe he shouldn't have mentioned Guerrero.

Chance could see them all flashing up in his mind: Guerrero, Ilsa, Winston, even Ames… How much had they suffered for being involved with a monster like him? He didn't deserve their sacrifices. He would always be a killer.

"Just shoot me", he told Joubert.

The Old Man's face turned unreadable. It was his business face. The face so many people had seen as the last thing in this world ever. He reached into his jacket.

Chance closed his eyes.

Joubert produced a taser and shocked him into blackout.

"I love you, Junior", he whispered.

_**A/N: Sorry for not posting yesterday, life got in the way. Thank you all so much for your reviews, I can't express what they mean to me. **_


	14. Chapter 14

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

_**A/N: There's a smut version of this hiding in the M section.**_

Chance opened his eyes and found himself surrounded by pitch-black darkness. Not for the first time waking up like that, he allowed himself a moment to adjust to his environment. Step by step his other senses came back, too. He perceived the smooth purring engine noise of an expensive car shifting gear in stop and go traffic. The slightly chemical, artificially flowery smell of a freshly cleaned trunk. The cold steel of handcuffs around his wrists and the vague taste of copper on his tongue, indicating that he had bitten himself while being tasered.

So the Old Man had decided against making short work of him.

Well, that had been predictable. Joubert had spent years waiting to take revenge on Chance, he would want to savor his moment of triumph, make it as slow and painful as possible. Chance wondered idly where they were going. Back in the day the Old Man had used a soundproof cellar in the Bronx for occasions like these, but judging from the decreasing street noise outside they were heading out of town. Maybe he wanted to do it at a more meaningful place – the Market? It would only be fitting if things ended where they had once begun.

Chance took a deep breath and let it roll through his body, just like they had taught him in Nepal. Whatever was coming his way in the next few hours, maybe days (the Old Man was a master at keeping people just alive enough to breathe on their own and feel pain) he would not fight it. He would accept it as the fate that had always been in stow for him from the moment onwards he had first committed the unforgivable sin of taking another person's life.

It was the fate he deserved.

He took another deep breath, filling his lungs step by step. In the end the Old Man would kill him, but instead of giving his survival instinct a wake-up call, the thought provided him with an odd sensation of peace. He exhaled, slowly relaxing collar bone, chest and ribs.

Death was the only redemption possible for him and yes, he was welcoming it. Only a couple more hours and everything would finally be over.

The car stopped. Chance stretched, trying to look as unthreatening as possible. He didn't want to be tasered again. For whatever reason he preferred to walk to his place of execution.

The trunk lid opened. "Chance?", a soft voice whispered. Ilsa's face came into view.

_Ilsa?_

He shook his head, wondering if the taser had caused some sort of hallucinations.

"Chance? Are you alright?"

Nope, no hallucinations.

"How in the world…?" Slightly hindered by his handcuffed wrists, he climbed out of the trunk, staring at Ilsa in wide-eyed confusion. They were in an abandoned-looking underground car park, no other vehicles around, the air damp and moldy.

"When Guerrero told us you were going toe-to-toe with the Old Man, we contacted him." Ilsa carefully watched Chance. He looked terribly old and tired. "We told him in advance that you were coming and we struck a deal – he would let you both go unharmed against a certain amount of money. Well, apparently Katherine got away by herself…"

"You _bought_ us? Ilsa, you've made a bad investment. Katherine…"

His voice broke and Ilsa rushed forward, pressing her fingers against his lips. With her free hand she unlocked his cuffs. "I doesn't matter", she whispered.

That was too much. That was just too much. _It didn't matter?_ His whole life was based on a lie and _it didn't matter?_

While he was still frozen in shock and anger, Ilsa stepped closer to him, pressed her face against his chest, embraced him, kissed his throat, his chin, finally his lips, endlessly grateful that the Old Man had kept his word. Granted, he had been promised a substantial amount of money in exchange for Chance's and Katherine's well-being, but there had been the very real possibility that he would let his hatred of Chance outweigh everything else.

Ilsa was so relieved to have him back, alive, uninjured, that she didn't even notice him tensing up at her touches more and more. And even if she had, she surely wouldn't have understood why. So it came as a total surprise to her when he all of a sudden pushed her away, grabbed her hair, twisted her around and slammed her face first against the hood of the car.

"You should have let him kill me", he hissed, holding her hands pinned above her head with his left, still handcuffed hand, his right hand deeply – and painfully – gripping her dark locks. "You should have let him put an end to all of this."

"Nobody deserves to die", she whispered, her voice muffled by the hood of the car.

A new wave of anger surged through his veins, broke through barriers, flooded his mind. "Oh, _really_, Ilsa? Are you sure about that?" He gave her body another shove and when she didn't whimper, didn't give away the slightest sign that he was hurting her like he was hurting everyone, like he had Guerrero, like he had Winston, like he had all those people he had killed and their relatives, he did it again.

Still no sound from Ilsa.

Wrath washed over Chance like a thunderstorm. He wanted her to stop lying to him, to confess that he was causing her pain, that he was a monster that deserved to be shot and nothing else.

Ilsa felt the car's hood grow moist under her breath. An oddly trivial sensation, given the circumstances. What had Katherine, that beast, done to him? He was totally off the rails, completely lost in self-loathing and about to prove to her just how monstrous he thought he was. She needed to guide him back to his true self, FAST, or she would lose him forever.

She twisted and turned around. He was still pinning her hands above her head, but his grip had loosened while shoving her. She locked eyes with him, then lifted her legs, wrapped them around his waist and pulled him closer. Chance could do nothing but stare at her.

"Nobody deserves to die", Ilsa repeated. "That includes you." She pulled his hands free from his grip, slowly, without any kind of struggle, sat upright on the hood and embraced him. Chance gasped for air. He couldn't believe it. As she tightened her hold, the tears started to flow, first one by one, then a continuous stream. Ilsa took his face in her hands and brought it level with hers. He was still staring at her, unbelieving that she could still do this, after all he had done to her. "You deserve to live", she whispered, brushing a kiss against his lips.

Cautiously, endlessly astonished, still crying, he returned the kiss. She opened his lips for him, invited him in, welcomed his tongue. Chance whimpered.

"I'm waiting for you", Ilsa breathed.

Where before self-hatred, fury and regret had reined, feelings he had thought long to be lost forever suddenly took over, filled him and consumed him. Peace. Safety. Forgiveness.

He caressed her breasts, her navel, her stomach, inhaled her scent, kissed where his touch wasn't enough and whispered her name.

Ilsa. Over and over again.

He melted into her. This was what they had been waiting for so long and it wasn't even remotely similar to what they had thought it would be like, but it felt right.

It felt _right_.

Chance bent over. She thought for a kiss and raised her upper body to meet him, but what he actually wanted was to press his ear against her chest. For a long moment he did nothing but listen to her heartbeat.

Losing himself in its steady rhythm, he realized that Katherine was meaningless. He, Christopher Chance, dark past and all, was loved by this wonderful woman. There had to be something in him that he wasn't able to see, something that made Ilsa, made his friends, go through hell and back for him. He still didn't know what it was that made them think he deserved to live, but if they saw it, he should believe them.

He should just believe them. And maybe one day he would see it, too.

"And what happens now?" He asked afterwards, physically and mentally drained, exhausted.

"We get dressed!", Ilsa retorted, suddenly laughing, and he broke into laughter, too. It was so goddamn cold in that garage. Quickly they put on their clothes and rushed into the car, letting the heating blow at full force.

"Let's go home", Ilsa told Chance. "Let's finally go home."


	15. Chapter 15

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

"We're in New York, Ames. If you can't buy it here, you can't buy it anywhere", Guerrero told her, giving her directions with concise, clipped gestures.

"Yes, but these kind of items… especially the very first one. I mean, who in the world… "

"I know a guy."

And of course the guy had everything in stock that Guerrero had written on the list. Regarding the very first item, they could even choose from various shapes and sizes.

"Let's stick with the classics", Guerrero decided after a moment of dithering, evil smile playing on his lips.

"What if there's no fireplace?", Ames asked, stomach tightening. It was one thing talking about it. But actually buying these items - in cash, of course - was a totally different story.

"We'll stop at an outdoor shop next", he replied. "I've achieved some really good results with portable gas cartridge stoves."

Under normal circumstances it would've made Ames happy, Guerrero admitting, at least sort of, that she had a point. Today, however, the prospect of what was lying ahead of them significantly dampened her mood. He sensed it, of course.

"Ames, one more time, you can still back out of this. We pull over, you get out of the car and this is forgotten."

Ames wordlessly shook her head.

… … …

The first thing Katherine noticed when she got back to her hiding place, a cabin in the woods, was the fire in the fireplace. She sure as hell hadn't let that burning. The second thing she noticed, almost simultaneously, was Ames, sitting by the fireplace and holding a long metal stick Katherine couldn't completely see, into the flames.

Ames started talking before Katherine could say anything. "It's interesting", she began, fighting hard to keep the tremble out of her voice, "how different cultures punish traitors differently. In Arabia they use whiplashes. In Japan, they cut fingers off – one per betrayal. In medieval Europe they burnt a traitor's rose into the shoulder of the offender."

With horror, Katherine realized what Ames was holding into the fire.

"We struck a deal with the Old Man", Ames continued. "He knew you and Chance were coming and he swapped the book beforehand. Your version is worthless."

Katherine's face went white with fury. Deep wrath drowned out any kind of fear she had felt. Once again she had been so close to fulfilling her dreams and once again someone had snatched them away from her at the last minute. "You don't really think you'll be able to mark me with that branding iron", she hissed, obviously getting ready to fight Ames.

"I won't", Ames replied. "But _he_ will."

Guerrero stepped into the room and closed the door behind him.

_**A/N: Tree979 pointed out that the text of the song "This Love, This Hate" by Hollywood Undead fits this fic perfectly - give it a try, the similarities are astonishing! **_


	16. Chapter 16

**Disclaimer: I do not own Human Target and intend no copyright infringement.**

When they came back to the office the first one they bumped into was Winston, in the entrance area of the warehouse's first floor. For a moment he said nothing, just studied the two of them, the way Chance was slightly touching Ilsa's back, the proximity with which they were standing to each other… apparently he liked what he saw. A wide smile spread across his face.

"I was just about to get some food", he said. "Guerrero voted for Japanese, but I think Ames could do with something Mexican. She said she wasn't hungry, but I'm sure some Sopa Azteca from Emilio will make her change her mind."

As he passed them by on his way out the door, he briefly patted Chance's upper arm. "Good to have you back", he murmured, barely audible, but Chance understood. He wasn't simply talking about his physical presence.

Chance took a deep breath of relief.

But now Guerrero...

Ilsa knew what he was thinking, took his hand and led him over to the elevator.

When they arrived on the office's main floor, they found Guerrero sitting on the sofa in the lounge. He had a bottle of Bourbon and two glasses in front of him and was just finishing pouring the second one. Chance hesitated, not sure what to do, but then Guerrero greeted him with a raised eye brow and a lopsided smile and he sat down next to him.

For a moment they just looked it each other. Eventually, the silence grew too much and Chance reached for the glass last poured, but Guerrero stopped him in mid-move with a short, clipped gesture.

"Not for you, dude", he said and nodded in the direction of Ames who was sitting all by herself in the conference room, looking a lot paler and more subdued than usual.

"I'll get that to her", Ilsa said, took the second glass, started to walk off and then hesitated. She turned, looked at the remaining glass in front of Guerrero, walked back to the men and then took that one, too.

A grin flashing across her face before changing her expression into serious and calming, she made her way to the conference room.

"You should really settle with her", Guerrero told Chance. "She's a good one."

"One day you'll have to explain about the cable fixers", Chance replied.

Guerrero chuckled, reached into the small cabinet underneath the coffee table and retrieved two new glasses.

"I think we're even, bro."

-the end-

_**A/N: Thank you all so much for following this little fic of mine and supporting me with all your comments, without your feedback I really couldn't have written it. **_


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